Dan Cornell – CTO, Denim Group

Cybersecurity: It’s All About the Coders

If we want cybersecurity, it all starts with the coders. As the Internet expands from the Web and Mobile to encompass the Internet of Things and beyond, coding is the central activity that makes all of this progress possible. The problem is that while we enjoy all the new capabilities that these technologies provide, we also want – and need – security and privacy.

If we look at all the things we try to do to provide cybersecurity now – anti-virus, firewalls, software updates – what we see is that all of these are bolted on to systems to address problems that coders introduced. And the reason for that is coders – who are ultimately responsible for security – are not actually trained how to design and build secure systems. University programs and coding academies all treat security as a separate or special concern, rather than a fundamental responsibility of coders building new technologies. This talk follows my journey as a coder to cybersecurity professional and attendees will leave the talk knowing how we need to fundamentally change the way we train software developers if we want to be able to safely enjoy the fruits of technological progress.

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About Dan

A globally recognized application security expert, Dan Cornell holds over 15 years of experience architecting, developing and securing web-based software systems. As the Chief Technology Officer and a Principal at Denim Group, Ltd., he leads the technology team to help Fortune 500 companies and government organizations integrate security throughout the development process. He is also the original creator of ThreadFix, Denim Group’s industry leading application vulnerability management platform.

Prior to Denim Group, Cornell served as the CTO of BrandDefense, architecting and developing their cutting-edge intellectual property protection technologies. Additionally, he developed simulation applications for the Air Force with Southwest Research Institute.

Cornell is a sought-after speaker on topics of web application security, speaking at international conferences. He has published papers on topics ranging from data security to high-end graphical simulations, as well as an IBM Redbook on building server-side Java applications for the Linux platform. He is a recognized expert in the area of web application security and has been published by the Association of Computing Machinery and the Society of Computing Simulation International.

Cornell is an active member of the development community, serving as the chapter leader for the San Antonio Open Web Application Security Project (OWASP) and the original chair of the OWASP Global Membership Committee. He also is a mentor for Techstars Cloud, a mentorship-driven seed stage investment program. He serves on the advisory board of Trinity University’s Department of Computer Science and is an active member of San Antonio Entrepreneur’s Organization (EO). An internationally recognized development trainer, Cornell has trained thousands of individuals from leading Fortune 500 companies around the world and government agencies on topics centered around secure web development.

He holds a Bachelor of Science degree with Honors in Computer Science from Trinity University where he graduated Magna Cum Laude.